Small Offerings To the God of Adventure
by Elin B
Summary: A collection of stand-alone ficlets, centred on various Strawhats. Mostly based on canon moments in the manga. Word count between 100 and a little over 500 words.
1. The Thought Of Giving Up: Usopp

AUTHOR'S NOTES: This is is an umbrella collection for shortfics and ficlets about the Strawhats, one for each crew member, written at different times: sometimes following a prompt, sometimes not. The common theme is that nearly all of them are taken directly from a canon moment, and the one that is not (The Gap Between) arguably still fits as a possible unseen moment in a canon arc.

This collection will not be updated further unless the crew gains another member - and then only if I get an idea for the newcomer.

SPOILER WARNING: The collection contains spoilers for Enies Lobby (1, 3, 6, 8), Skypiea (2, 3, 4, 7), the Drum Kingdom arc (5), Alabasta (9), and Thriller Bark (10). The tenth ficlet also contains a spoiler set much later, around chapter 600.

DISCLAIMER: The characters and situations of One Piece were created and are owned by Eiichiro Oda. They are used here without permission

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Small Offerings

A Collection of One Piece ficlets by Elin B

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_1. The Thought of Giving Up_

Usopp had never liked the thought of dying, not one tiny bit.

In that one moment, standing there on the roof after having shot Robin's keys to Franky, cape flying, not fully himself yet feeling more alive than ever, his blood was singing in triumph and he felt astonishingly far from despair despite the danger. For once it didn't seem so hard, then, to keep fighting, keep struggling, for the others and for himself…

And yet there had been a part of him deep within mumbling in quiet relief, mumbling something like, _Now I can die._

Stop worrying.

So simple.


	2. Up: Luffy

_2. Up_

It was the day they'd left the desert kingdom behind, when they'd lost Vivi and gained Robin and been awesomely saved from marines by Bon Clay. They'd managed to get away out to open sea and Robin had just turned out to be real funny.

All of a sudden a huge big ship had tumbled down from above, full of cool things like skeletons and swords and suits of armour; and then the log pose was pointing upwards and it turned out there was an island in the sky.

An ISLAND IN THE SKY.

Wasn't that about the coolest thing you'd ever heard of?

Oh, all right, so there were other really cool things, like the One Piece and Atlas and Hercules beetles. And stuff. But it was certainly the coolest _new_ thing he'd heard of!

How could anyone not want to go somewhere like that?

How could anyone not be willing to risk life and limb and ship and hat and food for just a chance of getting to a sky island? Especially since he'd found the map and everything! That meant they _had_ to go, right?!

It would be such a great adventure!

So you yelled at Nami for a bit and she yelled right back and gave you a few lumps but eventually she figured out something you could do in order to get there, as you'd known she would. And now they were going to go south in the rebuilt Going Merry to find that Mystery Knock-Up Stream and reach the clouds, or die trying. But after all the help Diamond-Guy and the ape-guys had given them, they weren't going to let them down it by letting themselves get smashed into tiny bits!

What was there to think about? There was nothing to think about.

All you had to do was to haul anchor, set sail, follow the southbird, and go!!


	3. I Don't Want Anything: Nami

3. I Don't Want Anything 

"What's more important, adventures or your life?!"

What an utterly _Luffy_ thing to say.

"Life! And then money!"

Some of Nami's dreams were like aftershocks; deep rumblings in her mind that weren't heard until days or even weeks after the events had been lived through and survived. They re-enacted some particularly intense moments, only slightly abridged and distorted; closer to reality and therefore often more frightening than the true nightmares.

She had yet to have any such dreams about Enies Lobby. But on several of those remaining nights in Water 7 afterwards, as they'd waited for the log pose to set and for the new ship to be built and for Usopp to come back, it was Skypiea that she found herself back in.

The metallic tang of electricity everywhere; the smell of burned flesh, burned wood, burned soil below; the hot sunlight in the slightly alien air so high above the Blue Sea; the gleam of the giant golden ship around her, rising higher and higher; the air still vibrating from the thunder-charges and maybe even anticipating future attacks; white-hot death leaning in utterly close and all but certain should she choose to reject the mad god smirking on his throne before her.

Sweating and trembling, her body felt weak and small and terribly alive; her mind determined to take in as much as possible of these wide-awake moments, these few seconds remaining to her, for of course there was no choice really.

"My own dream of the future? Sure, I've got one," she'd told the god then (and was telling him again now, in her dreams). "But if I leave with you now, I will be entirely alone. A dream of the future without companions is worthless!"

At this point, the dream would let her remember that she'd been holding Luffy's hat at the time, and how the coarse battered straw had felt against her hand.

"There are many things I want…and want to do! But if I have to abandon my friends for those things, to go with you…then I – I don't want anything!"

Knowing such a thing about yourself, knowing she'd made that choice and would do it again – that should be reassuring, shouldn't it? And she supposed that in her waking life it was. In a way, she even felt grateful for it. She'd thought as much the first time she'd awoken with a jolt from this dream, sweating in her bed.

But as long as the dream lasted, there was nothing at all comforting about this knowledge. In fact, the very certainty of her resolve, the hardness and sharpness of it, only served to make the moment even more terrifying.

_This is the way it ends_, she remembered thinking to herself.

No way she could run away anymore.

No way to avoid being brave.

In Nami's dream, there was a taste of something luminous and trembling and hot and sharp in her mouth; something that was not quite despair but right next to it, on its wavering border. And the air was crackling with madness and power.


	4. Now Or Never: Zoro

_4. Now Or Never_

The coast was finally clear.

The swordsman glanced around his surroundings for one last time. Yep, still no other ships on the horizon, nor any creatures emerging from the sea. The anchor was securely attached. There were still no people visible on shore besides his crewmates. As for those, the ones on the shore were all quite busy with running around being silly or exploring lazily or fawning over navigators right now. And the last one had finally stopped chatting with him and was now strolling gently toward the shore as well.

He frowned as he looked down at Nico Robin's departing figure. She'd done all right so far, in fact proven herself pretty damn useful, but he still wasn't prepared to trust her as far as he could throw her. The thing she'd just said about never expecting an adventure stuck in his mind, though. It had seemed oddly honest. But that was no reason to let his guard down.

All the same, no-one was looking at him, and so Zoro was finally free to do what he'd longed to do for a good while now, which was to jump down into that milky cloud-sea and feel its lovely bouncy softness all around him. Touch the bottom, roll over; stretch out so very briefly in that one permissible childish moment.

And nobody near enough to hear him burst out in silly giggles.


	5. The Gap Between: Sanji

_5. The Gap Between_

Sometimes it wasn't so much the incidents themselves that stuck in you head, the ones you'd been there for, to witness and see through. Sometimes it was the unknown moments between them.

In Sanji's memory, the Drum Kingdom stood for intense cold, interminable snow; a terrible overarching gnawing worry about Nami-baby: it recalled clogged-down snow-battles against large rabbit-like carnivores where he couldn't get a steady footing (in retrospect, he supposed he should have done the carrying and Luffy the fighting, at least for that stretch); there'd been an ever-mounting sense of hopelessness and desperate frustration: an avalanche came tumbling down, they'd been running futilely, and then a cliff in front of them had threatened Nami on Luffy's back so he'd tried to shield them. Then a horribly sharp pain in his back; and then nothing.

He'd woken up in a sickbed and found out it was in the witch's castle and that Nami-baby would be okay. Then most of the time after that had been hectic as well, what with chasing around a reindeer first for food and then recruitment; helping to fight a shitty bastard king and his oafish retainers; then his back gave out again and he was helpless to do anything but watch. Finally he'd slipped back into unconsciousness once the battle was over and didn't wake up again until they all had gotten down from the mountain, on a sled apparently.

He never learned – never asked – exactly how Luffy had managed to carry both of them up the whole length of that mountain, all alone. Although the two sets of tooth-marks he found on different places on his coat gave him perhaps a few inklings.

Before Wapol showed up and in-between bouts of reindeer-chasing, Sanji had found a spare moment to himself, alone outside the castle. The weather had been taking a break right then: no snowing, and no howling winds. You might, perhaps, sense an air of quiet watchfulness about the place.

Then Sanji ambled slowly through the snow over to the mountain's edge. He lit a cigarette and leaned forward, looking down at the island below him, at the tininess of the dark green treetops he saw from above.

He stood there in for a while in the bitter cold, exhaling thoughtfully.

Then he turned and trudged back to the wintry castle.


	6. Building Blocks: Robin

_6. Building Blocks_

Perhaps she – the thought comes to her very quickly, like a bird riding swift sea winds on a bright but cold morning – perhaps she has in some ways become not too unlike her enemy.

The tower of stone where she is standing in shackles is very strong, thick and well-guarded, in order to both keep criminals from escaping and to prevent break-outs from the outside. But then again, governments also build similar houses for their own leaders, strong and thick enough to protect their most valuable men from enemies. Perhaps the chiefs within might feel like prisoners themselves at times, despite all their power.

She has kept herself apart always for survival, the lowest stones around her inner self erected long ago now, but fresher ones added with the years. Eventually there came a day when she did not need to place new stones on top of the old ones but got by as she were, the structure firmly in place, solid and secure. She found herself a new shelter to hide under, an unusually intriguing – and amusing – little band to follow for a while. Adaptive when she had to be, she realised that to fit in with them she needed to relax her guard slightly, to open up some windows, lower the odd drawbridge; maybe even knock a rampart or two down for good. But the main walls still held well. – Or so she had thought, not realising her crewmates had ways to sneak through even so.

She has heard some of the explosions from here, and deduced more. They can't win, but they have surely made their mark on this place already, felling many soldiers, blasting through walls. Now – now, there is Luffy on the roof on the other side of the abyss, shouting her name, and she doubts the rest of them will be long in coming. Her legs are wobbling: inside her, cracks are spreading, stones are shaking.

It is quite cruel of them. She is going to die no matter what. There's no need to insist on breaking her up and tearing her down before the end.


	7. Getting Down: Chopper

_7. Getting Down_

The great octopus ballooned above them, miraculously turning Merry's heart-stopping free-fall into a stately downward saunter. And in the very next moment, chimes rang out in the air from above: the unique, indescribably beautiful sound of Shandria's great bell. Perhaps the Skypieans weren't that upset about the loss of all that gold after all.

Chopper craned his neck to gaze back up at Cloud's End and the White-White Sea. He felt so full with memories and emotions, all jumbled up inside him: the enticing dream of getting to a sky island; the thrill of the Knock-Up Stream; the wonder of arriving and exploring; the creeping fears of Upper Yard; the explosions of helpless, paralyzing terror; and then, that moment when he'd faced one of Ener's priests all by himself, had decided to fight for real and had _won_. The next opponent had proved too strong for him, but he had still survived, and so had all of his crewmates. Then, waking up just as the great battle ended, he had treated more people and worked harder than ever before – better, too, he thought. If Doctorine could have seen him then, she would probably have offered lot of critical comments on his work, but on the whole he still thought she would have been proud of him.

And Doctor – if Doctor could have seen him now, as he stood here beside his brave, strong, laughing, lawless crewmates, as their ship floated down from their skybound adventure as gently as if carried by the power of dreams – yes, he was sure Doctor would have been proud of him.

They were getting down safely but they weren't getting down _to_ safety. Down there, they would doubtless find new adventures waiting for them, and that would mean fun explorations and wondrous new sights and happy campfire dances. But it would also mean new terrors, new moments of looking death in the eye; new battles they could not afford to lose. Because they were pirates. They had to risk everything. Chopper had known that a long time, but perhaps he hadn't truly understood it until now.

_But whatever happens from now on_, he thought, looking around him once again, _I will remember this forever_. The song of the great bell; the gentle creaking of the ship; the calls of the southbirds, telling them 'good-bye and see you later'; the patches of dark blue visible between the white clouds underneath them; the shine in his crewmates' eyes, even brighter than the gleam of their beautiful treasure. And though the bell chimes still filled the air, you could just about make out the faint murmur of the waves far below, slowly growing in strength as the Blue Sea pulled them all closer.


	8. Taking Second Chances: Franky

_8. Taking Second Chances_

There'd been no warning at all. Just a loud explosion and then a gaping hole in the wall as the Strawhats had literally crashed their way into Franky's life. And maybe he should have taken that as a telling sign, but he'd been flush with the triumph of this unexpected great windfall the guys had brought home – _finally!_ – and this guy seemed pretty weak anyway and who cared what pirates thought? Wasn't like they'd gotten it legally in the first place.

Iceburg said pirates were clients like everybody else, but Iceburg even took money from the bloody _government_, so who'd listen to him? No, pirates were just scum, pure and simple.

So he'd screwed that first introduction up pretty royally and had helped mess up their team rather badly, as he'd learned later on when he'd started to change his mind about these weird people. But stuff happened, and now he was just a few meters away from the only one of them he'd heard about long before. A tall figure in a leather dress, with long black hair and almond eyes in an anguished face. Bounty picture plus twenty years.

Iceburg had introduced her into his mind as a woman of dark menace, a dangerous demon who cared only for herself. He'd carried that impression for five years until it was upended completely only an hour or so ago into its very opposite. Now the Puffing Tom was shaking and chuffing around them toward its destination, and fate seemed bent on giving him second chances with these guys and maybe it was time he took the bloody hint.

_Maybe if she can do it, I can._

A plan took shape in his mind and he grinned slyly, cracking his knuckles. He could smack a few walls down himself, after all.


	9. The Sweetest Sound: Vivi

_9. The Sweetest Sound_

The steady sound of raindrops on the roof continued all through the night. The full moon outside looked blurry through the wet windows, but the light still spread itself all over her friends' sleeping figures. Perhaps tonight it was raining all over the kingdom.

Each of them were wounded and wrapped in bandages, with deep cuts and broken bones and bruises all over. They'd been roughed up and smashed down and dried out and poisoned and utterly exhausted.

Vivi turned her head from the window every so often, seeing how the shadows on their faces shifted as the moon gently moved through the night-time sky. The rain kept falling and her friends kept snoring and somehow the two sounds combined was the sound of victory. No, more than victory. Of peace. Of freedom.

It had been a very long day indeed. The longest she had ever been through. And now that the battle was over, there was little enough she could do.

She stayed in the sickroom throughout the night, and the rain never stopped. It kept coming down in gentle abundance, and she watched it fall while keeping guard over her friends, knowing deep in her heart she had begun to tell them goodbye.


	10. Opening Chords: Brook

_10. Opening Chords_

He's eaten and drunk, danced and laughed in Moria's ruined castle, but now the party noise recedes in his mind as he sits down at the piano and starts to play _that song_. The fingers leap over the keys, the notes all coming down where they should.

But Mr Luffy tells him of meeting Laboon and it's too much; his playing grinds to a halt, the heart he doesn't have too flooded with emotions. The past reaches out to him and he's _there_, lost again in those long-gone moments.

_– In his past, he's a young man at 18, ready to join his country's army; then a pirate at 36, approaching the Reverse Mountain and the Grand Line –_

He shouldn't let the song stop, but he can't go on alone. So he reaches into his skull and takes out the sound dial, letting his old crew's singing fill the air. Distantly he hears Miss Lola, Mr Luffy and others joining in. They are here in _this_ now. But he is drifting from several nows, only the beat of the song holding him together.

_– In his future, he stands on a stage before a vast audience, holding a guitar rather than a violin, ready to play them his soul music one last time – _

And the fifty years are nowhere, they're nothing; they have no place in this room, in this song. Here there are only old promises, old grief, old joy, and new life. All crowded together. No emptiness.

_– Far far away on the other side of the world, a whale is still faithfully waiting – _

He is so very happy to be alive.

The song stops, for now. He puts the sound dial back into his skull. It will remain there till the day he's fulfilled his promise.

And then there is no more waiting: he asks the request, and the captain answers. His captain, now.

And his future is ready to start happening.


End file.
